Alone
獨
Illustration book
CHAN Hoi Ting 陳鎧莛
2020 BA Creative Media graduate
Abstract
《Alone》is an illustration book consisted of short stories and articles. My father worked in mainland since I was small. Therefore he was absent for my childhood. My attitude already changed from always missing my father when I was small to getting use to it when I grow up. While I grow older, there is more time of being alone and no longer have somebody take care of me anytime. Since then, I started to understand how lonely my father was suffering for so many years. However, I remember once my father had told me that, alone is not lonely, you can feel joy when being alone.
Description
《Alone》is an illustration book consisted of short stories and articles. My father worked in mainland since I was small. Therefore he was absent for my childhood. My attitude already changed from always missing my father when I was small to getting use to it when I grow up. While I grow older, there is more time of being alone and no longer have somebody take care of me anytime. Since then, I started to understand how lonely my father was suffering for so many years. However, I remember once my father had told me that, alone is not lonely, you can feel joy when being alone.
Graduation of university is approaching, I feel discouraged sometimes. Seeing my friends planning their future, insecurity and loneliness hit in my heart. Instead of gathering with peers, I would rather being alone sometimes. Gradually, I doubt the saying of “Human beings are social animals”. When decided to create an illustration books with the theme of “loneliness”, flashbacks of city memories recalled in my brain. Those close but distant strangers in train, those flashing neon signs in the dark.
Realising my depression towards the change of life, it is normal to miss the people and things happened in past. Noticing one thing that never changed is drawing. Drawing is the only thing that I was interested and consisted in doing uptil now. In this chaotic era, it is lucky for me to keep drawing quietly. Speaking of luck, I think I am quite a lucky person, not experiencing things that are really painful. Lucky person like me doesn’t seem like appropriate to talk about loneliness. However, my loneliness is all because of rejecting everything. Everyone must once have a lonely moment. Only if you are willing to believe, willing to offer, willing to love, you can see happiness in this lonely world.
《獨》是一本編輯了散文和小故事的插畫書，圍繞著孤獨作主題。父親長年於內地工作，因此缺席了我的童年。 小時候對父親的思念隨著成長而變成習以為常。但慢慢長大，獨處的時間多了，身邊不再無時無刻有別人照料和呵護，才漸漸理解到父親獨自一人在異地承受著多少孤寂。然而，我記得父親曾對我說，孤獨不等於寂寞，孤獨也能感到快樂。
快將大學畢業，心裡不免洩氣。看著大伙兒對前程的憧憬與安排，內心掀起不安與孤獨感。相比起與同伴聚在一起，有時更想獨處，也漸漸對「人是群居動物」這說法產生懷疑。當決定以孤獨為插畫書主題時，一幕幕在心裡回放的倒是城市的境況。那些在地鐵靠近又遙遠的陌生人，那些夜裡閃爍的霓虹燈。
察覺自己為生活的轉變感到惆悵，難免眷戀過去的人和事。發現從沒改變的是畫畫這件事，至小以來只有畫畫是我一直感興趣和堅持下來的。在喧囂混亂的時代，我依舊能靜心畫畫也算是一種幸運。說起來，我的人生一直也算幸運，沒有遇上多少痛苦的遭遇。像我這麼幸運的人好像也不太適合說明孤獨這事。仔細想想，感受過的孤獨追根究底是因為拒絕了一切。只要願意相信願意給予願意愛，在孤獨的世界裏也能看見幸福的輪廓。
